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Steps

1

Download Dwarf Fortress, at the homepage. It is free, and doesn't have to be installed.

Get tile sets if you want. Tile sets show pictures instead of letters, and are very helpful, especially for beginners.

2

Run the program. It is "Dwarf Fortress.exe".

3

Create a world using the number pad arrows (make sure Num Lock is on) and the enter key to press "Create New World Now!" This will create a world for you using a pseudo-random generator. Watch as the mountains, deserts, rain forests, etc. are created. Dwarf Fortress uses a very complex and powerful engine to calculate erosion, rain shadows, drainage, animal simulations, etc.

If you are using a laptop, or your keyboard does not have a number pad, be sure to press E.S.C and change the key bindings by finding "move secondary selector up" and changing it to something with the up arrow. I recommend ALT [up]. do the same for "move secondary selector down".

4

Press Start Playing, and move around the region map with the number pad. Press shift while holding the number keys to move the world map. Use the u, h, k, and m keys to move around on the local map. (All maps are of the same world. They just have different zoom levels.) Press e to start your castle.

Try finding a place with lots of greens, but with not-so scary monsters; these will be identified in purple as scary, haunted, or terrifying. Make your first fortress an easy one. A good area is one with 2-3 layers of non-rock (will be listed in embark bar as brownish colors) followed by flux-stone (white) marble, granite, or obsidian. All of these rocks are full of delicious goodies such as hematite, limonite, magnetite and tons of gems to cut. Obsidian does not generally contain many of these things, but can be cut into swords by a crafts dwarf which can boost your military in the beginning.

If the place selected has an aquifer, try somewhere else. Aquifers have less stones, because the water washed some precious stones away. Aquifers also create a layer of water under your fortress, which is very bad if you want to dig a deep fortress. If you are using the newest version v.31.##, then make sure your embark location has some sort of water supply such as a river or brook, as farming requires irrigation.

5

Press "prepare for journey carefully". You will be presented with a semi-confusing menu of seven dwarfs. These are the dwarves your fortress will be starting with and you can choose their professions to suit how you want to play. For example, on your first dwarf, press the right arrow key, or '6', and then increase his skill in mining to around skilled or proficient. The numbers next to his name in blue should decrease. Each dwarf only has a limited amount of skill points to use, so choose carefully. You are going to want approximately 2-3 miners, a woodcutter/carpenter, a grower/herbalist/brewer, and if you are going to be building lava spewing volcanoes to Armok, then a dwarf who is at least a competent mason. Making one or two of your miners a mason or stone detail maker will help out a lot. If you are using v.28.181.40 or older, your last dwarf should probably be an ambusher/marksdwarf as he will start out with a free crossbow/bolts/leather armor. As of v.31.## there is a bug in the hunting skills, and doctoring is highly preferable (diagnostics,suturing, etc.). Make sure to make one of your dwarves a novice judge of intent,organizer, appraiser, and record keeper, he will be designated as expedition leader. If you are more observant, you will have noticed some numbers in the bottom-right corner decreasing as you designate skills. You only have 2000 of these points, and if you are out, press TAB to see a list of everything your expedition is planning to bring. If you are pre-v.31 then you may want to consider ditching the anvil, as it takes up half your points. You can always trade for one later. I recommend bringing 2-3 picks (depending on the number of miners your party has.) 1 battle axe, 1 anvil depending on version, about 20 plump helmet spawn, 2 dogs, 2 cats, 60-80 units of assorted alcohol, 50-80 turtles (which give shells) get rid of crutches, buckets, and splints if you are using a newer version and only bring three ropes. This is really the only stuff your first fortress needs. You can add things not on your list by pressing 'n', and increasing the things on your list by pressing 'alt' up or down if you took my earlier advice.

You will see some dwarves wondering around, waiting impatiently for their fame and fortune. They also have pets, food, drinks, and a wagon they used to get there. This is a third-person game, which also makes dwarf fortress unique.

6

Press the tab button until the local map (big one) and the command bar is visible.

7

Make your castle by digging into the earth. You could live outside, but that's for humans and elves. Make a hallway. The hallway should be 3-4 squares wide, to avoid traffic jams. You miner will come to dig. If there are no hills around you may need to build down stairs in a suitable location. After you build you down stairs, press 'd' then 'i' to select up/down stairs, mine out these on the z-level below your up/down stairs in exactly the same pattern as the above. Do this for 3-5 z-levels. The first or second level (underground) should be dedicated to farming and/or storage of items. Any kind of layer that is non-rock is ideal for this, as rock layers leave behind stone when dug out, stone takes up one square, and so if you grid out a storage area of say, andesite, you are going to need to do a lot of clearing out.

8

After you have several layers surveyed, press 'd' then 't' and designate a large amount of trees to be cut. Then press 'p' and get a bunch of plants. After this step, this guide will be referring only to version 40d (v.28).

To dig, press d (read the command bar), press enter on one corner of the square to dig, move the cursor, and press enter on the other end. You can also use your mouse to do this.

9

Press shift+> or shift+< to go down or up.

10

Make a carpenter workshop by digging a 3 by 3 square next to the hallway, and then after it is dug, press b, w.

Community Q&A

If this question (or a similar one) is answered twice in this section, please click here to let us know.

How to move the map

Using arrow key will move the cursor around, or the map (depending on which menu you are, or if you are playing, using the map viewer...).

Pressing 'SHIFT' will make the cursor/the map move much faster.

Pressing 'SHIFT+5' will make the map view go one level up. Pressing 'CTRL+5' will make it go one level down.

WARNING : If you are using a non-english keyboard, you will need to press the 5 key which is just above the letters; using the Numpad for changing the map level doesn't seem to work.

Pressing 'Space' will pause/unpause the game.

How to do basic stuff

You can't control directly each of your dwarves : for them to do something, you have to select an area and tell them to do a specific thing.

To gather resources, and to dig in the mountain side (we're dwarves, remember ?) you will need to select an area. Press 'd' to open the designation menu, then choose from the menu what you want to do.

For example : 't' to gather wood, 'd' to start mining an area... When you've chosen, you will need to select the area where you want them to perform that act.

Now you need to select the area you want to be mined/farmed/woodcut/other. Move the cursor to your desired location, then press 'Enter' once. Move the cursor around; you'll see that the area you pressed 'Enter' is blinking. Pressing 'Enter' somewhere else will select a rectangle, and the dwarves will start working (assuming the game isn't paused, 'Escape' to resume).

But since they started collecting resources, your dwarves need somewhere to put the collected goods. You will need to create stockpiles for that : Press 'p' to enter the stockpiles menu, choose the kind of stockpile you want, then select an area like explained above. Go for an area near the future entrance of your fortress.

Remember, you can cancel any designation : go to the designation menu, then choose the corresponding order (press 'x') and select the area you want them to stop working on.

You can also remove stockpiles, by going to the stockpiles menu (press 'p') and selecting the correct option : 'x'. The dwarves will stop storing stuff at the place you've selected, and will move them to another stockpile (if any are available).

Tips and tricks

Using a texture pack is highly recommended (unless you enjoy decoding the Matrix), especially if you're getting started. This one in particular is useful, since you only need to download the file, then press a button to install the texture pack.

At first, you'll need to gather a lot of information to know how to play, and to know what to do. Don't be discouraged, this game is one of the most advanced (in term of possibilities). Don't hesitate to take a break. By the way, tutorials and texture packs can really improve your understanding of the game.

Your dwarves have needs ! Be sure to always have food and alcohol in stock. Create a storage room. Dig a little room in the earth/rock, and when the space is cleared, put a food stockpile ('p' for stockpiles, 'f' for food).

You can create a lot of things and buildings. Use B to place buildings. Most of them need to be crafted first though. Select the workbench menu with 'w', then select the appropriate workshop for your desired building. The first workshop you'll want to have is the carpenter workshop, used to make beds, tables (for meeting hall), chairs, and barrels (for food storage).